Berkeley Software Distribution

Berkeley Software Distribution is a derivative of the Unix operating system that was created by and is distributed by the University of California, Berkeley. The first official release of "Berkeley UNIX" was in 1977. Other derivatives of the original BSD Unix such as FreeBSD, NetBSD and OpenBSD are also collectively known as "the BSDs." BSD Unix and its derivitives have had a profound influence in the architecture and design of future modern operating systems, from Linux to Mac OS X to Microsoft Windows (especially Windows NT).

History

In the mid 1970s the Berkeley campus of the University of California became a hotbed of activity in the budding world of Unix operating system development. When one of the original creators of Unix (Ken Thompson) taught there during a sabbatical in 1975-1976 this also encouraged students at the University to hack away on a brand-new, revolutionary OS (operating system).

In 1977 the first Berkeley UNIX version was released, from a lab run by a grad student named Bill Joy (who would subsequently become one of the 'big names' in Unix and Computer history in general when he co-founded Sun Microsystems).

BSD Licenses

See main article: Berkeley Software Distribution licenses
The BSD family of licenses are considered "Permissive licenses," meaning users are granted complete control over software that is derived from the original BSD Licensed software.

Related Topics

• Unix